So, then, he was remembered by a few friends. The knowledge consoled him for the heedless rush and flurry of New York.
An impulse seized him to break the seals of an envelop marked, "To be burnt, unopened, by my executors," and take therefrom two letters which he knew it contained. The action was nothing more nor less than a trial of his new-born resolve; since the letters were Nancy's to himself and Willard's to his mother. He read them calmly and dispassionately. Willard's malicious threat he dismissed quickly. It had served its vile purpose, and its victims had paid the price demanded, the mother by death, the son by suffering. But Nancy's few disconnected sentences gripped his imagination with a new force. Had he misjudged her? he wondered. What argument had Willard used that she yielded so promptly and completely? The broken, pitiful words brought a mist before his eyes. Poor girl! Perhaps, in her woman's way, she had endured miseries from which life among the Indians had rescued him. Then he recalled the farewell message she had given to Dacre, and the momentary belief that he might have acted precipitately died away. Should he ever meet her in the years to come? He hoped not, with all his heart. He must so contrive Meg's life and his own that they would pass their days far from the haunts of society. The worship of the golden calf permits its votaries no escape. Thank Heaven, and he and his wife would never practise the cult!
Glancing casually through the rest of the heap, his attention was drawn to a couple of cablegrams. He opened one, and found that it was dated in the late autumn of that memorable year. It read:
"Leave everything, and forget all that has passed. Come at once.
One night, sleeping in the depths of a Patagonian forest, he had been aroused by the snarl of some wild animal close at hand. He had never known what beast it was that rustled away among the undergrowth; but he felt the same sense of impending evil now. Thinking the other message might be more explanatory, he tore at the envelop with nervous fingers; but the contents were an exact replica of its predecessor. Then he saw that one had been sent to Bison and the other to New York on the same day, the place of origin of each being London.